FANS ARE NOW RATING THE SHOWS AS WELL
1-5
5 BEING THE BEST
Rated "5" by Michele Jackson aka "mjackson866"
Still the same old story. What price glory?
Hmmmm, the price of glory is about $125.00 or 5 times that if you buy through a scalper!
Just back from Stevie's second show at the Greek Theatre. I enjoyed it more than yesterday's. For me, the sound was better. Maybe that's because my seat was right in the center this time. Also, I think Stevie was just a little more animated.
Goodness, I just can't say enough about Chris Isaak. I've liked his music for at least 10 years, but I've never seen him live before. Tonight was my second time and in two nights he did something I never saw Stevie and Lindsey do in 135 shows: he changed his clothes! He had a on a pink suit last night and a blue one today. Actually, Lindsey did change his shirt once during the SYW tour. So, I was exaggerating just a little. In Moline, Illinois, he wore a black shirt.
Anyway, yesterday I said that Chris' banter was scripted. Well, he has certain punchlines that he repeated, but a lot of his chit chat was something he didn't say last night and he is HILARIOUS. I can't even tell you. If you like Conan O'Brien or Tina Fey you should go just to hear him talk, much less see him perform. And the thing is, his irreverence is so intelligent. He's both silly and clever.
One thing he does that draws the audience in for the rest of his set is run up into the stands, all the way to the back of the theater, the nose bleed section. He plays around up there, sits in the seats, poses with people on his way down. There is nothing not to love about this man.
He performed three songs tonight that he didn't sing yesterday. It really scared me, because if Fleetwood Mac tried to do that it might prove fatal for them. I don't even want them to get any ideas. Even an attempt at such setlist changes would be too dangerous for them. Two of Chris' new songs were my favorites: Can't Do a Thing and Notice the Ring.
Last night they let a group of people onto the stage, including children. He had a conversation with one woman. Tonight, he pulled one girl onto the stage and she started dancing, but then she pulled up her top to reveal her bra and security removed her before Isaak could work her into his routine.
Anyway, Isaak is dee-lightful. That's enough of that though, I should stop coveting him and just return to my own moody, brooding, brawling quintet, though.
The main attraction: Bootylicious segues into the intro to Stand Back.
The clothes are flying tonight. Stevie soon lets her shawl drop to the floor and also ditches that black moa thing she wears around her neck, pulling it off and throwing it to the ground.
Before Dreams she says that she doesn't usually do this, but since this tour is to support Crystal Visions, she wants to reflect on what it's all about. In 1981 she, Lori, Sharon and Waddy got together with Jimmy Iovine and created Bella Donna. Now, all these years later, she stands before us, "a woman who has never married, with no children and no regrets. She says the audience members are her crystal visions and she's happy to be exactly where she is.
Well, ok but isn't it strange to keep telling people you have no regrets when they haven't asked? I mean, if you're giving an interview and the reporter asks if you have no regrets, it's fine to answer. But in the middle of a concert after a thundering version of Stand Back, as you acknowledge the applause and look out at the sea of adoring faces, it's kind of anomalous to suddenly announce out of thin air, "I have no regrets about being unmarried with no children," appropos to nothing!
Then she says that Tom Petty told her that he was going to give her a song that would make her a star and he did. So, I think she is getting ready to sing, SDMHA, but she didn't.
Dreams, If Anyone Falls, Rhiannon, Enchanted. For Sorcerer she talks about her and Lindsey coming to Los Angeles and what they found here was equally exciting and scary, but they had a premonition about what was to come.
Gold Dust Woman: She ends it by chanting, "You should see me now," her arms outstretched. "You should feel me now. You can't see me now. You can't feel me now. You can't save me now. You just can't do it." Lori, Jana and Sharon pick it up: "You can't save her now. You can't save her now." Stevie glides over to Waddy, stands behind him undulating as he plays, her shawl floating like wings on his shoulder. Then he turns and goes behind her and she shields him with her shawl, back to the audience.
Since I first saw them a couple of years ago, these new arrangements of Sorcerer, How Still My Love, and Gold Dust Woman have me using two adjectives I don't usually associate with Stevie: sexy and soulful. Quite winning.
So, she talks about touring with Tom Petty and she says "lucky for you he's here tonight." Well, I thought that meant he was coming on stage to duet with her. Otherwise, why would it be lucky for me? Why is the fact that he's inhabiting the same outdoor space that I am be lucky?
Who knows! Anyway, after that build up, he doesn't sing with her. The audience sees neither hide nor hair of the man.
She says touring with him is the most fun she's ever had. "And I'm not just saying that because he's here." Yeah, Stevie I know you aren't, because I've heard you say it 50 times when he hasn't been anywhere in sight, but thanks for the reminder. She giggles and kind of covers her face in an excited girlish gesture, before kicking into I Need to Know.
She says that like Sorcerer and Rhiannon, she wrote Landslide in 1973. She says there's something about that year. Actually, I don't think she did write Landslide in 1973. I think it was 1974. I start to jump up and refresh her memory. Lindsey argued. Snow. Took your dog. Everly Brothers. Very angry. Your dad was the vice-president of Greyhound. Bus strike. Yadda, yadda, yadda , but I guess this wouldn't be the time or place to argue with her. So, 1973 it is.
She dedicates Landslide to the audience and says that all you have to do is look at the images on the screen behind her to know that this means the world to her. Many, many pictures of Jess Nicks and the montage ends with a picture of him on his motorized scooter waving goodbye. You know, the old video with just the pictures of Stevie made me cry the first time I saw it and now that it's more about her father than her, I cry even more: for her dad, my dad, the past in general. There's an ending on every street corner.
She doesn't give Fall From Grace an intro this time. Just blasts it out. There's no reason Stevie can't rock like this in FM too. Hey, I want SOTM back.
When Stevie introduces the band, they have fun with the fact that she's characterized some of them as old and some of them as new. She points at them each saying, "New, not-new, not-new". She says Lenny is "new-old."
How Still My Love was not a stand out on Bella Donna, but these days, I would put it on the TISL album, right along with Love Is and I Miss You. She screams, "go on. Get out! But you won't forget me."
She doesn't have a shawl to twirl over her head tonight, but she ends the song by sashaying down the aisle and off the stage hand upraised.
After the Edge walk, I love the way she comes back onstage and does a little dance with each of the back up singers, holding both of their hands. When she gets to Carlos, he has the guitar in one hand, so she just puts her hand in his other and dances that way. I love the frolicking. She seems very happy. Sends high kicks Waddy's way.
Rock and Roll. Beauty and the Beast. At the end, Stevie talks about the sad state of music today and how we have to keep coming out to support live concerts.
They take their bows and Waddy walks her off the stage.
Goodness. I can't believe I have to go to work tomorrow. No wonder I'm tired, thirsty and wild-eyed in my misery.
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